Nokia, Harvard Business alumni, join to help boost mobile app development in India

Bangalore, April 26, 2013: Mobile phone leader Nokia India has joined handsa with AppCampus (Finland) and members of the Harvard Business School Alumni Angels (India Chapter), to boost mobile app development on the Nokia Lumia &Windows platform.
Their initiative, ‘Appcelerate-India’ will see the investment of over $500,000 through grants, seed funding, mentoring, incubation resources to discover disruptive applications and nurture talented Indian mobile start-ups.
Says Pekka Sivonen, Head of AppCampus: “It’s exciting to build this type of start-up collaboration, tailored for the Indian market, where we truly get to reach developers and start-ups locally and help them evolve into the next Big Thing. This collaboration between AppCampus and Harvard Business Angels can bring significant and sustainable new opportunities for mobile-focused entrepreneurs and their businesses”.

Adds Ravi Gururaj, Co-founder, HBS Alumni Angels India Chapter: “India has strong technology credentials and a renowned entrepreneurial background. The successful evolution of the technology industry in India presents a great opportunity for mobile app developers. We are now seeing a massive spurt in passion from the local ecosystem towards entrepreneurial ventures in mobile products. Through our collaboration with AppCampus and Nokia India, we want to support app entrepreneurs in their development work and create an innovation-led start up culture”

Nokia and Microsoft invested 18 million euros to form AppCampus, a mobile application accelerator programme managed by Aalto University in Espoo, Finland. AppCampus is aimed at fostering mobile application development on Windows Phone.